By Ernio Hernandez
17 Mar 2006

Theatres across the globe are uniting to present a worldwide reading of What I Heard About Iraq (A Cry For 5 Voices) March 20 that will commemorate the third anniversary of the invasion of Iraq.

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The work, based on the Eliot Weinberger article which uses actual quotes about the invasion of Iraq from politicians to soldiers to Iraqi citizens, debuted Sept. 11 at the California venue. Simon Levy directed his adaptation of the galvanizing article which was originally slated to end Oct. 9. Stephen Sachs produced.

In January of 2005, Weinberger penned "What I Heard About Iraq" which ran in the London Review of Books and in Fellowship magazine in the United States. The article which continually repeats the phrase "I heard" uses quotes directly from politicians, military chiefs, U.S. soldiers and Iraqi citizens as does the stage version. The work serves as a commentary on the truth and lies revealed over the course of the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

"The play is neither fiction nor speculation; it takes us into the war and confronts us with the human drama, the human toll," said director-adaptor Levy in a statement. "This is not about history or about something going on 'over there.' This is about what's going on here, in America, now."

Among the venues planning to present the work (March 20, unless noted otherwise) are:

United States